The most important part of this, in my opinion, is an easily-missable detail at the bottom: every one of these labels will come with a unique identifier to a database of broadband plans, presumably one maintained by the FCC alongside the numbers on these labels. That's huge. The FCC will be using that to look at Internet access and fairness and everything related to broadband access. It's the equivalent of the hospital billing data but for Internet. Really looking forward to what broadband access numbers in the country really look like when there's a centralized database that you're not allowed to lie on.
Lies, damn lies, and statistics. As long as the data is broken down by zip code, and not street-by-street, broadband competition and thus access will still be made up of lies large corporations tell the FCC. Where the FCC really needs teeth is to be able to hold those corporations to the advertised rates. If a speed test can't give the advertised maximum numbers, FCC fines should land on the companies advertising those rates.
This isn't true. The FCC broadband map can identify individual postal addresses, indicating what is and isn't available at that specific location. I have personally used this to identify false information that was provided by some nearby ISPs to try and inflate their numbers.
Challenging these is a very easy process and requires that the ISP respond within 30 days. I've won all my challenges; basically correcting my entire extended neighborhood from false information. (Some ISPs do this for grant money reasons)
I like that instead of listing maximum speeds (which is always provided with a disclaimer) the provider is listing typical speeds, which should give the consumer a more general sense of what to expect.
I don’t love the “read our policy” lines, as it just continues the practice of hiding behind the complexity of legalese.
This is good, but is mostly useful in a place where you have enough competition to compare providers. Otherwise it’s just a simplified listing of how terrible your limited options are.
I think that we should be careful about "gamed" speed tests, like Ookla. I've learned that I should ignore whatever Ookla says, as the ISP optimizes for it.
I've heard that the Google tests are pretty good, and I also just learned that fast.com is good, because it sits on Netflix's IP range, and ISPs can't game it, without also letting Netflix have full throttle.
Netflix tests usually go to the Netflix cache at your ISP's nearest POP. Usually I find the Netflix speeds at close to max speed for my connection as I'm in the same city as my ISP's Netflix cache. However other test sites show more realistic speeds to sites in other networks. Ookla/Speedtest gives you the option to select offshore servers which helps to identify issues with ISPs underprovionsing off shore bandwidth. I've had ISPs with excellent on net speeds but poor off net speeds so I'm generally more interested in off net speeds.
The speed tests can also tell a different story than actual use, even if they are not gamed. I went a bit deep when my HTTPS/TCP downloads from my otherwise unloaded server and previously beefy CDNs were not reaching anywhere close to what they should. I could get full speed with multiple downloads in parallel. speedtest.net and other sites showed everything was fine. I could also hit the speeds via iperf UDP tests in both directions, but iperf TCP download (to my home) showed the same slow speed.
The issue was a very low packet loss which does not really concern UDP or quick/small TCP transfers, but screws up big TCP (multi GB) transfers as TCP of course assumes congestion and throttles back. I could see some TCP retransmissions and DUP ACKs which confirmed that guess. I assume the speedtests used either not-TCP (WebRTC?) or multiple connections, so they were papering over the issue. One could also argue they did their job and stated the raw (IP-)capacity of the connection, without worrying about details of a specific protocol (TCP in this case).
I think fast.com is the right answer for some cases, because it is as close as you can get to "real" loads, if your intended use case is video streaming from Netflix.
(Sidenote: my issue magically resolved itself a few weeks later, before I could be bothered to haunt my ISP.)
Then what? The best thing I can get is Comcast with 1.2G down and 40mbit up. They don't have much pressure to do better, and because they have a very direct profit motive to make torrenting as bad as possible because they own a large stake in Hulu and content companies, they're not likely to change.
Do individual consumers honestly have enough choice in broadband at a single location that this would actually add value? It's been a while but last I checked "one ISP, two if you're super lucky" is the norm.
To the extent that you do have options, how likely is it that the secondary player is the same size and playing level as the majority player? Does this benefit them or hurt them?
I'm in a Top 50 market. You've got Fiber and DSL from AT&T, 5G from T-Mobile and Cable from Comcast. AT&T and Comcast have very uneven areas of coverage still and mostly don't overlap and 5G rollout started, but it's only available at a small fraction of addresses within the city. This would have almost no value for a residential consumer here.
Even if you only have one ISP, they often have multiple plans and it can be hard to compare them. Most cable companies won’t even tell you what their upload speeds are. It definitely still has value even if you only have one ISP.
Yes, this is super valuable. You’re biased because your mental filter as a techie has already taken out all of the choices people actually have.
You didn’t include geo sat, starlink, 4g tethering, microwave stuff, and whatever other WISP miscellaneous things each area has going on.
To you they aren’t “high speed choices”, but that’s just because you’re picky. If someone just wants to be able watch Netflix there are many options. If someone just wants to email pictures and pay their bills, there are many different options there too.
Getting this will give all of the non-power users a way to see what’s available and pick something when they don’t need 1gbps 20ms latency.
I would love to see Comcast forced to put a precise number on what upload speed they're giving me. They actively refuse to say. There's nowhere, anywhere in the Xfinity interface, that tells me what upload speed I'm supposed to be getting. I've pretty much figured it out based on forum posts and repeated testing.
On similar technology, here in Germany, I get 1000 Max down, and 50 Max up. But the latter are only promising 35 average and 15 min; numbers are for AFAIK 5min slices, averages over nominal 24 or 48 hours.
I forgot the download promises, but they where like 850 700 or so for the non-max values in same order and same definition.
Edit: these AFAIK act as SLAs that give me instant unilateral contact cancellation rights with no notice period.
And possibly fraud if they knew they couldn't provide it to me with the network like they had it when I joined; they are required to keep the network up to continue holding compliance, but it's wonky.
even if there is no choice wouldn't a clear label help the consumer recognize how bad the offer is compared to other areas, and thus create pressure to improve the service?
I'm so excited that this report card will include latency. I've had so many family members ask me why their high download and upload speed connection was "so slow" when their latency to a Google PoP was quite high. Now I can point to that number and tell them "lower is better". Now I just wish they published jitter numbers as well.
It would be great if these were required to be made available in:
* A machine-readable format, not just human readable
* with a fixed schema
* Precise units (ie, no MB vs MiB disambiguation required)
* Reliability stats with historic information
* Accurate maps related to speed, especially with tech like DSL that is distance dependent.
This is such a welcome requirement in my book. Especially the requirement to include upload speeds. One of the providers in my area (spectrum) never shows the upload speed anywhere on any main page. It is buried deep in very fine print with the terms and conditions.
What good is that high advertised speed if you can never get it during most of the day or peak times? We should skip the bullshit and only sustained minimum speeds should be allowed to be advertised. It would at least give the ISP the incentive to invest more their infrastructure.
Also what's the point when significant portions of the US have de facto regional broadband monopolies?
I mean clear labeling is always better than not, but if you have no actual options how much does it help?
Where I live my choice for actual wired broadband is: Spectrum. That's it. My only other viable Internet option is 25 mbps DSL from AT&T. So if I don't like the service from Spectrum: tough luck. If I'm looking at the label before ordering Spectrum and don't like what I see: tough luck.
Yup, welcome to my neighborhood in Austin. Literally two miles in any direction, and you've got at least three gigabit-class ISPs, but not here. Spectrum and AT&T DSL are it for "broadband" providers.
And I checked, and no T-Mobile and Verizon do not provide 5G fixed wireless service in this neighborhood. That was going to be my backup. AT&T LTE is available here, but it's no faster than DSL and during times of high load, it's much worse than DSL.
My concern is the cap. Xfinity has one, it's 1Tb. I blow through double that each month due to WFH. I'm paying the extra fee to make the cap go away, but it's disingenuous to sell 'gig speeds' an retain that 1Tb cap. That means you can blow through that in a weekend Teenaged Boy LanParty.
It's not the same animal, by any stretch of the term, but I remember all-you-could-eat Internet for $20 a month with my 52k modem.
Yeah, it's a little disappointing that they are being obtuse with some of the stats on the label. Data caps, overage fees and bandwidth throttling should definitely be highly visible.
> Yeah, it's a little disappointing that they are being obtuse with some of the stats on the label. Data caps, overage fees and bandwidth throttling should definitely be highly visible.
I agree about throttling, but data caps and overage fees are both on there, no? Right under the avg speeds it lists "Data included with monthly price" and the line below it is the overage amount in $/GB. Seems very straightforward to me.
Readit News
Challenging these is a very easy process and requires that the ISP respond within 30 days. I've won all my challenges; basically correcting my entire extended neighborhood from false information. (Some ISPs do this for grant money reasons)
ZIP+4 solves this to some extent, if anybody bothered to actually use it.
More on Gigi Sohn: https://www.theverge.com/2023/2/14/23599075/gigi-sohn-fcc-ne... and https://www.theverge.com/23437518/biden-fcc-gigi-sohn-fox-ne...
I don’t love the “read our policy” lines, as it just continues the practice of hiding behind the complexity of legalese.
This is good, but is mostly useful in a place where you have enough competition to compare providers. Otherwise it’s just a simplified listing of how terrible your limited options are.
I've heard that the Google tests are pretty good, and I also just learned that fast.com is good, because it sits on Netflix's IP range, and ISPs can't game it, without also letting Netflix have full throttle.
The issue was a very low packet loss which does not really concern UDP or quick/small TCP transfers, but screws up big TCP (multi GB) transfers as TCP of course assumes congestion and throttles back. I could see some TCP retransmissions and DUP ACKs which confirmed that guess. I assume the speedtests used either not-TCP (WebRTC?) or multiple connections, so they were papering over the issue. One could also argue they did their job and stated the raw (IP-)capacity of the connection, without worrying about details of a specific protocol (TCP in this case).
I think fast.com is the right answer for some cases, because it is as close as you can get to "real" loads, if your intended use case is video streaming from Netflix.
(Sidenote: my issue magically resolved itself a few weeks later, before I could be bothered to haunt my ISP.)
It is always good to list typical speeds, but with most major ISPs it won't change anything. The big thing is forcing them to list upload speeds.
To the extent that you do have options, how likely is it that the secondary player is the same size and playing level as the majority player? Does this benefit them or hurt them?
I'm in a Top 50 market. You've got Fiber and DSL from AT&T, 5G from T-Mobile and Cable from Comcast. AT&T and Comcast have very uneven areas of coverage still and mostly don't overlap and 5G rollout started, but it's only available at a small fraction of addresses within the city. This would have almost no value for a residential consumer here.
You didn’t include geo sat, starlink, 4g tethering, microwave stuff, and whatever other WISP miscellaneous things each area has going on.
To you they aren’t “high speed choices”, but that’s just because you’re picky. If someone just wants to be able watch Netflix there are many options. If someone just wants to email pictures and pay their bills, there are many different options there too.
Getting this will give all of the non-power users a way to see what’s available and pick something when they don’t need 1gbps 20ms latency.
Edit: these AFAIK act as SLAs that give me instant unilateral contact cancellation rights with no notice period. And possibly fraud if they knew they couldn't provide it to me with the network like they had it when I joined; they are required to keep the network up to continue holding compliance, but it's wonky.
And probably viasat, hughesnet, and starlink. And mobile broadband plans from the three major carriers and probably a couple dozen MVNOs.
But two is enough to compare. And if there’s only one option, it’s even more important that consumers are fairly informed.
[0] https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/FCC-22-86A1.pdf
I mean clear labeling is always better than not, but if you have no actual options how much does it help?
Where I live my choice for actual wired broadband is: Spectrum. That's it. My only other viable Internet option is 25 mbps DSL from AT&T. So if I don't like the service from Spectrum: tough luck. If I'm looking at the label before ordering Spectrum and don't like what I see: tough luck.
And my situation isn't particularly rare.
And I checked, and no T-Mobile and Verizon do not provide 5G fixed wireless service in this neighborhood. That was going to be my backup. AT&T LTE is available here, but it's no faster than DSL and during times of high load, it's much worse than DSL.
FML.
And maybe you can use that label to more easily convince your local politicians that they should be giving more companies access to the poles.
Maybe I'm missing something, but the labels use average speeds, not rated maximums.
It's not the same animal, by any stretch of the term, but I remember all-you-could-eat Internet for $20 a month with my 52k modem.
I agree with your point, but at least the information would be provided in a standard format.
I agree about throttling, but data caps and overage fees are both on there, no? Right under the avg speeds it lists "Data included with monthly price" and the line below it is the overage amount in $/GB. Seems very straightforward to me.